


Voices

by TheGameIsOn_Geronimo



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, But more hurt than comfort really sorry, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hearing Voices, Hurt/Comfort, Obi-Wan Needs a Hug, Poor Obi-Wan, Post-Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Self-Exile, Tatooine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-06
Updated: 2018-06-06
Packaged: 2019-05-18 22:19:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14861339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGameIsOn_Geronimo/pseuds/TheGameIsOn_Geronimo
Summary: There are many ghosts on Tatooine. Sometimes they speak.





	Voices

**Author's Note:**

> I really don't know where this fic came from, I just thought about it one day and had to write it. I blame exam stress.  
> Maybe one day I'll give Obi-Wan a break and write some fluff.  
> Hope you enjoy it!  
> All characters and places etc belong to Lucasfilm and George Lucas.

They whisper in the wind and mutter in the shifting sand. Low murmurs that form into words which turn into pleas, and cries, and accusations.

They stalk his steps and haunt his waking moments, only to speak louder and harsher in his dreams during the desolate darkness of the desert night. 

He recognises Anakin's voice first. The words are distorted in anger and pain, and they whip him like lashes as he pulls his hood up against the wind. They stab him like needles pressing into his heart.

_‘I hate you’_ , they say, again and again. ‘ _I hate you. I hate you. I hate you’_. He’d thought the repetition would make it easier to ignore, easier to accept and turn away from - a truth too terrible to hold and keep. It doesn't stop him from clutching his head, or his chest, and rocking himself to sleep with tears streaming down his face.

After that there is Qui-Gon Jinn, the wind creating a voice he never thought he would hear again. His former master’s words of wisdom echo off the dunes and make his heart ache.

And then there is Padmé, her high, calm voice following his footsteps as he goes about his business. He made her a promise, and the voice reminds him to keep it.

The Force has always spoken to him. Since before he can remember it has spoken of joy, and grief, danger, and amusement. It has been his constant companion, the one thing that has supported him. Even in this empty world of swirling sand it stays by him - a constant sentinel that he can't escape. Sometimes he wraps himself in its embrace as a child would to their mother, seeking comfort and warmth. Sometimes he wishes it would disappear, leave him to the slow decay of time, and surrender him to the darkness of his own thoughts. As it always has, on the world of Tatooine, the Force speaks. Although this time, it uses words.

 

***

 

He tries so hard to reach his old master, as Yoda had instructed. He sits in the light of sunrise and sunset and meditates deep into the Force, searching for secrets and coming back empty-handed. The sound of his rasping breath masks the chimes echoing in the breeze, but as he lives, and survives, and struggles, they get louder. They form a voice he has not heard in decades, deep and sonorous and full. Just a few words here, and there at first, but then sentences and the ghost of a chuckle. He hears himself be called a Padawan again, and it breaks his heart as he wishes he could return to that easier, simpler time. The voice fills him with a warmth he had forgotten he once held every day, a feeling that had been stripped away on that fateful day on Naboo. In hearing the voice, he concludes two things – either he is completely losing his mind, or he has succeeded.

'How are you here?' He says to the sky.

' _The Force showed me a way_.' Is the reply.

'Will you teach me?' An innocent request, stretching back to a time of light and laughter. How many times had he asked to learn more, to expand his knowledge of the universe and the Force. It has been a while since he has been the learner, but he accepts the role with a strange sense stirring in his stomach. It may be excitement, but he has forgotten how the emotion feels, or in fact how any emotion feels. The emptiness here is all-consuming, so he clings to this new feeling with both hands and holds on tightly.

' _Yes_.' Answers the wind, and it ruffles his hair and pulls on an imaginary braid.

He trains every day, in the cooler shadows of day break and night fall. Qui-Gon's voice speaks teachings of the Ancient Order of the Whills into his ears, and he listens, and remembers. He imagines he can feel a long-fingered hand resting on his shoulder, thinks he can hear the trickling of water from the room of a thousand fountains.

'I wish I could see you.' He breathes the admission into the slowly heating air.

_'I'm sorry_.' The voice says back.

When he opens his eyes, there is only sky and sand.

 

 ***

 

Another day and he sits on the ground, sketching meaningless marks into the sand. He bows his head under the glare of the sun, closes his eyes, and speaks to no one.

'I'm sorry'

_'Why?'_ The voice talks back, an impossibility that he cannot explain, but one he is eternally grateful for. He can almost imagine the slight frown of confusion, the furrowed brow, the piercing blue eyes.

'I failed you'. The words drop out from his lips like heavy weights, even as they drag down his heart in his chest. They are simple, and plain, and seem to reverberate in the emptiness. 

_'You did no such thing.'_ It is almost laughable that the voice sounds affronted. 

'I did as you asked. I trained him. But I did not do it well enough. He fell, and I could not save him.' He speaks with certainty, for these are truths he has told himself many times.

_'You have not failed me.'_ The voice replies, sure and calm and resonant. He wishes he could fall into it, let it hold him just for a few moments. Wishes he could believe the words it spoke _. 'You did the task I laid before you, far too heavy for too young shoulders. There were many faults through the years, but few were yours.'_  

He wants to trust the voice, one he had always relied on through so many years, and yet this is too much to believe. He opens his eyes, and laughs his incredulity to the twin suns.

 

***

 

The voice that belongs to Anakin calms down at some point. It points out that the moisture collector is broken, and tells him the quickest way to fix it. It follows him through the streets of the market and comments on the different products. It stands by as he runs through katas in a deserted hollow, the voice grumbling out the mistakes he makes. He is less flexible in his older age, that is for sure.

'I failed you too.' It is stated like a fact, because it is believed and accepted.

_'As did I'_ replies the wind. 

'I'm sorry.'

Silence. The apology is not enough. How can words encompass the mistakes he has made, the events that have transpired. He knows in his heart that forgiveness will never be an option for him. He will bear his regrets to the grave, struggling under their weight.

 

 ***

 

Occasionally the voice angers again, blowing into a gale, and whipping the sand into clouds of cutting shards of dust. He locks himself in his hovel, closes the shutters, and holds his knees close to his chest.

The storm raps at the windows and doors and it demands to know _'Why didn't you kill me? Why did you leave me to become what I am now? Why did you never understand?'_  

He clasps his hands over his ears and scrunches his eyes closed, but the voices can get into his head and into his heart and crack both open. He sobs and tries to placate the hurricane with stuttered words. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It is never enough.

The words follow him into his nightmares. In the twisted sheets he writhes, lost in the heat of a battle fought over boiling lava, mind unable to comprehend that the man – the Sith – in front of him is his Padawan, his friend, his brother. He wakes screaming into the blackness, and the chill of the desert night cools the sweat coating his skin and sets his limbs shivering as he curls under the thin blankets. The biting air creeps into his bones and he holds himself together with his arms wrapped around his legs. In some ways he misses the burning heat that Mustafar provided.

The voice of his former master speaks to him as he floats between sleeping and waking. It murmurs words of comfort that fall on deaf ears. He isn’t entirely sure the voice is real, although the teachings he gives make sense, or if he is merely going mad. Idly, he wonders whether death would bring silence. If death would let him be free of his ghosts.

In his semi-conscious state the voice and the cold breeze causes his thoughts to shift, memories rising to the surface. He slogs through knee-deep snow on the icy planet of Hoth. He stains the ice red on a freezing Separatist stronghold. He sits with his master outside the caves of Ilum, a crystal chiming in the force clutched in his fist, and a warm chest pressed against his back. With dreams of a happier time, perhaps he can slumber peacefully.

 

***

 

In Mos Eisley they start calling him the desert wizard. The man who rarely shows his face, but can calm herds of wild bantha and fight off krayt lizards without getting a scratch. They say he came from the stars, appearing one day with no fanfare, always completely alone. They say he speaks to people who aren't there, but little do they know they reside in his head.

He rarely travels to the town, only going when the need for essential supplies forces him to make the long trek. He hides his face in his cloak hood, and sticks to the shadows, avoiding any Storm Troopers which may be patrolling the streets. He wonders if any have been sent to look for one of the last Jedi, and then he smiles to himself, because for one, they will never find him, and for two, he can no longer call himself a Jedi. Jedi do not feel so much, and they certainly don’t hear voices.

One day, the voices urge him to traverse the alleys of the town, leading him into the complex maze of streets and sellers until he reaches a small repair shop. Here, the voice of Anakin sounds younger and purer. He is defiant in his announcement of his name, and then unsure in the question he poses: ‘ _What will happen to me now?_ ’ The words ring with memories, and he imagines looking down at the small blonde-haired former slaver and saying, ‘The Council has granted me permission to train you. You will be a Jedi, I promise.’ His brain adds, ‘And then you will fall.’ He hopes that if he had known then, he would have done things differently. He wonders if he would have listened more closely, held the boy more tightly through his nightmares, let himself love the boy as a son, as Qui-Gon had once done for him. The weight of possibilities presses down on him in the small room, and he escapes back into the alleys and runs from the painful what-ifs and what-could-have-beens that the voices pelt at his back.

 

***

 

Padmé follows him as he traverses the desert. She was always strong and sure, and the loose sands and blinding heat don’t change that. Her voice flutters around him as he looks out across the plains towards the small homestead, watches the young figure silhouetted against the sky. The boy is playing in his plain white tunics, he runs to and fro with starfighters clutched in his little fingers.

The wind sighs, ‘ _He looks happy.’_ He doesn’t reply, merely nods.

_‘I wish I could be there for him.’_. He dips his head, the weight of sudden responsibility pressing down his shoulders. He wishes he could get closer to the boy, say hello and receive a blinding smile in return, but Owen Lars does not want him near the child. He says he is a madman. That he is crazy. It’s true, from a certain point of view.

‘ _Luke.’_. The wind breathes the name like a prayer. This boy is hope, and life, and light – everything that has been stolen from the galaxy personified here in bone and flesh and blood. He is the son of Anakin Skywalker, the ‘Hero With No Fear’, and Padmé Amidala, the bravest Senator he knows, and he yearns to reach out to him, to tell stories to him. He supposes he will just have to be content with watching him grow from afar. After all, maybe that is for the best, as everything he touches seems to break.

‘ _He’s so big now’_. He’s not sure how the air can infuse the words with so much love, but he has long since passed the point of questioning it. Padmé always come with him to see her son, making sure he is keeping his promises.

‘He is,’ he agrees as the setting sun stains the desert orange. It makes the sand suddenly look like shifting lava and his breath catches in his throat in fear. But then he blinks, and the light has shifted, and there is only a small boy full of innocence and happiness.

He turns to leave. He fears his mere presence will defile something so pure.

 

***

 

It becomes normal, which should probably scare him, although he can’t summon enough energy to worry about it. The voices are his only companions, the only beings he speaks to with any regularity. Without them, he would be completely and utterly alone. Perhaps that is what he deserves after all.

Qui-Gon lingers while he cooks his dinner, calmly directing the use and preparation of different ingredients. He was never one for cooking, but his former master had a certain culinary flare. The voice seems devastated that he tries to survive solely on beans and rice, and tries to gleefully point out any vegetables on sale at the market. He smiles at the voice’s enthusiasm, and placates it by spending far too many credits on a bunch of Chando peppers and a bag of muja fruit. It seems to please Qui-Gon, so it makes him feel slightly lighter too.

 Anakin, as he so often did in life, interrupts his meditation with inane comments. His voice whispers gossip about the local vendors into his ears in the town, and then reminisces on their own adventures.

‘ _Remember the sixth time I saved you, Master? What would you have done without me?’_  The voice is teasing today, a welcome difference from the common anger.

He opens his eyes and sighs at the blank wall.

‘At least you can remember the number of times you saved me, I lost count of the number of times I’d saved you years ago, but I’m sure it was over twenty.’

It is familiar, this banter and these jokes, things lost over the years but still remembered with joy and a familiar heartache.

The voice chuckles, and it throws his mind back to days of training, of sitting together in the canteen on their Star Destroyers, of giggling over the comms in their starfighters. It hurts, and also heals. He is less sad than he was about Anakin’s fall – he will never be whole again, but he is getting better. He can remember Anakin for the man he was before everything happened – the one he trusted with his life. He knows that one day he may look upon Anakin again, but it will not be the Anakin he loved, it will be Darth Vader, and he is prepared for that.

Padmé always comments on the animals that visit his hovel, cooing over the bantha that nuzzle at his hands. She judges his reflection in the mirror when his hair gets too long, and when grey strands start to stand out amid the ginger.

‘ _It makes you look wise,’_ The breeze observes.

He glances over his shoulder at the empty room, raises his eyebrows.

‘Me? Wise?’ He questions incredulously, ‘I think you mean senile’.

The air laughs, and he can laugh with it. Without the voices, he would have forgotten what laughter sounded like.

 

***

 

Sometimes he thinks he can see them, and that is when he decides he has truly lost his marbles. In the heat of the day, the horizon shimmers into a figure in a dark brown cloak with long grey hair if he stares at it for long enough. As soon as he blinks, the figure has dissolved back into the heat haze.

The shadows cast in the moonlight coalesce into a black-robed individual. In the silver light, the silhouette has its hood pulled up, its face masked in shadow, but he knows who it is. It stands at the end of his bed, and is silent. Watching, waiting. He pulls the blankets over his head and tries to forget the world. In the daylight, the same figure comes in the shadows of his hut as he whittles away the hours. At these times it is still in black, but the sleeves are rolled up, arms stained with engine oil, and a laughing face looks out over the plains. He watches him out of the corner of his eye, and notes that the figure leaves no footprints in the sand.

Her reflection sometimes surprises him. A flash of brown hair in his water cup, the bright splash of colour from an ornate dress over his shoulder in the mirror. Whenever he turns his head to look, the room is always empty.

He quietly wonders whether they will become more solid as he gets closer to death. Whether their presence represents his descent into madness, and then into blissful oblivion. If that is so, he wishes they would hurry up.

 

***

 

It is a surprise to see someone trekking towards his home in the desert. He sees the figure from his front door step and wonders how someone could have gotten so lost. As the stranger approaches however, his heart misses a beat.

It takes everything in him not to run to the man, to throw his arms around him in a hug. This is someone he knows, someone who knew him before everything changed. This is a relict from _before_.

He waits in his doorway, and watches Bail Organa approach. The man is dressed in far too dark colours for Tatooine – a thought he hears Qui-Gon comment on behind him. On his left, the shadows lean against the wall with their arms crossed, assessing the newcomer with an imagined frown. From the window, Padmé’s voice shrieks, ‘ _Bail!’_ , in gleeful surprise.

Senator Organa stops in front of him – his hair is greyer than he remembers, and there are deeper lines around his mouth and eyes, but the years have been kinder to him than they have been to the hermit in the desert.

‘Now this is a surprise,’ he says, and his mouth quirks up slightly, rarely used muscles twinging slightly.

‘We were passing through the outer rims,’ Bail replies, ‘I thought I could pop in.’ He smiles, ‘The locals said I could find the wizard in this direction.’

He huffs, and leads the way into his home, ‘I don’t have much magic left in me, they just tell stories.’

The Senators lingers in the centre of the main room, surveying the few measly possessions he owns, and shrugging out of his robe, ‘You were always one for your tricks, I’m sure you have a few left up your sleeve.’ His eyes are slightly concerned as they pass over him, so he turns away from the assessment and busies himself with the kettle.

‘ _You must ask him about Leia.’_ Padmé’s voice demands.

‘I will.’ He responds softly.

‘What was that?’ comes through the divider.

‘Nothing.’ He calls.

‘ _Maybe you should tell him you hear voices.’_ Qui-Gon points out.

‘No. He’ll think I’m mad.’

‘ _He might already think that’_ Anakin too, the excitement of the visit really has brought them all out.

‘He would be right.’

He takes the tea into the other room, and Bail smiles in thanks.

‘Are there other people here?’ He questions casually, ‘I thought I heard you talking to someone.’

‘No,’ he replies simply, hands wrapped around the warmth of this cup, ‘There is only me here. Just me. Nobody else.’

Bail looks like he wants to say something else, but decides against it. He asks the man about the Empire, about the rebellion, about his life in general. He asks about Leia, and when he hears that she is doing well – growing strong and brave like her mother – Padmé’s voice breathes a sigh of relief.

‘And how is Luke?’ Bail asks.

‘He looks like his father,’ he tells him honestly, ‘But he is full of light.’

Bail smiles, ‘I’m glad to hear it.’

When the man leaves, the desert suddenly feels far emptier than it did.

 

***

 

He is spring-cleaning, even though there isn’t really a set season of spring here, because why not. He has time, he has years. He sweeps dust off the floor, wipes down the surfaces, and shifts furniture around. As he moves an old wooden box into a back corner, Qui-Gon’s voice rings out.

‘ _Why don’t you carry it anymore?’_

He pretends like he didn’t hear the words, as he puts a bundle of cloth on top of the box lid, letting it fall down the sides slightly to hide the chest mostly from view.

‘ _Why?_ ’ The voice demands.

He straightens up, brushes his hands off on his tunics, and doesn’t turn to face the emptiness. It is easier to pretend the voice is real if his eyes don’t give him contradictory evidence.

‘I am not worthy of it.’

There is silence, and then a sigh.

‘ _You will always be worthy of it._ ’ The voice is filled with pain, and he feels a twinge in his gut that he was the one who caused it.

‘I am not.’ He repeats. ‘I let my emotions cloud my judgement. I failed in my duties. I have no right to call myself a Jedi, so I do not need to wield a lightsaber.’ His voice rises into anger towards the end, as he spins round to face the air.

Why don’t the voices understand? He is not the man he was, and never will be again. He is broken, and sad, and lonely, and he is not the Padawan who built his first lightsaber, or the Knight who had his braid cut by someone who wasn’t _his_ master, or the general that led troops into war, or the master who sat on the Jedi Council. He is nothing anymore. Nothing. A shadow in the desert, a wave in the shifting sand. A spectre sent to watch over one thing for the rest of his days. He will complete this quest with his head high, but he will not hold his lightsaber.

‘ _Oh, my Padawan,_ ’ The voice is so sad, ‘ _You are the bravest man I knew, and the strongest Jedi you could be. You followed the Force, and it led you to this, and I am sorry. You have always and will always be a Jedi Master, and so you should carry your weapon with pride.’_

He sinks down until he is kneeling on the floor, and tears trickle down his cheeks, dripping onto the stone.

‘The last thing-‘ he gasps out, as pain slices through his chest, ‘The last thing I did with that lightsaber is maim my brother. I can not hold it again.’

‘ _You did the right thing.’_ Oh, when did Anakin get here, ‘ _You were right to try and stop me.’_

_‘You need the lightsaber to protect my son,’_ Padmé too, can’t they just let him be? ‘ _Protect his brightness in the Force with a sword of light.’_

_‘You’ll need it one day.’_ Anakin’s voice is quiet, timid even, ‘ _To kill me.’_

The dam breaks, and he sobs into his knees.

He struggles towards the box, wrenches the lid open, and pulls out one of the weapons tucked safely inside, leaving the other for possibly a pair of younger hands.

He holds it loosely, the weight just right, and the balance perfect. It fits into his hands, like it belongs there, and the crystal inside it chimes a greeting to him. He used to say again and again that this weapon is a Jedi’s life. Look how easily he threw it away. Tears splash down onto the metallic hilt, as his stands, flourishes it and activates it. The blue light washes over the room, as the familiar hum fills his ears. It is like coming home after a long mission. It is like nothing has changed, and yet everything has. He may no longer be worthy of the weapon he built all those years ago, but for his burden, perhaps he can be allowed to wear it again.

He deactivates it, and clips the lightsaber to his belt. The familiar weight settles against his thigh, and a hole inside him seems to fill up.

 

***

 

The voices are his constants. They are always there, through dawn, and noon, and dusk, and the night. They are sometimes noisy, and sometimes quiet. They are sometimes calm, and sometimes angry. They are consistent in his life, and it is both a comfort and a curse to hear them. They keep him company, and stave off some of the loneliness, but they also remind him of what he has lost.

As he treks across the dunes, he decides they are obviously having a noisy day. Qui-Gon is commenting on how nice the sunshine is – ‘You do realise it’s always sunny here, or is your memory going in your old age?’ ‘ _Don’t speak to your former master like that.’_

Anakin is raving about new designs for the moisture vaporator – ‘ _Just think, if we increase the surface area around the cooling bars more water would be able to condense on them’,_ ‘Anakin, I’m not taking it apart again after what happened last time.’ _‘Last time was not my fault.’_

Padmé is admiring the sand. Like husband, like wife he supposes – ‘ _I mean, the sand is a nice colour, but once you’ve seen one bit of it it’s all the same, isn’t it? Just a bit of green would be nice.’_ ‘Yes, it’s certainly a shame that plants need actual water to survive. I don’t know, maybe I should start trying to control the weather.’ ‘ _Don’t get snarky with me.’_

They are loud, they are reliable, they are only pale imitations of his friends, but he doesn’t care because they are here.

And then another voice cuts through the din.

‘Oh hello, Sir!’ It’s a young voice, high and excited. It pulls him to a stop instantly, and he turns to it immediately, eyes wide in surprise. A blonde-haired boy in white tunics is running towards him, eyes bright with mischief, and mouth pulled into a smile. He leaves footprints in the sand, just as he does himself. He’s real.

‘Hello, young man,’ he says, crouching down to be on eye level with the child. The force rings with happiness, and completeness, and light.

‘Are you the desert wizard?’ Luke Skywalker asks him, too young to be ashamed of such a direct question.

He laughs, even as tears prickle in his eyes. In the boy in front of him he can see the reflection of another boy he once knew, a boy who wanted to visit every star in the universe.

‘I am.’ He confirms.

‘What’s your name?’

He hesitates, takes a breath, ‘Ben Kenobi.’ He answers. The name feels different on his tongue, but it also feels right. He is not the same man as Obi-Wan Kenobi. That man was a Jedi Master. Ben Kenobi is a desert wizard.

‘And what’s yours?’ He asks the boy, even though he knows the answer. This is the first time he has ever spoken to the child he smuggled away from the Empire. This is the first time he has been close enough to touch him, to hear his panting breath and see his rosy cheeks.

‘I’m Luke Skywalker’. The child proclaims proudly. One day he might find out what that name truly meant.

‘You’re a long way from home, Luke. You shouldn’t wander this far out into the desert.’

‘I’m sorry, I just wanted to meet the desert wizard.’

‘Well, here I am. You’ve accomplished your mission, now run along home.’

The boy nods slowly, and then surveys him one last time. ‘You don’t seem mad.’

He smiles, ‘Oh I am, I assure you. I hear voices, you know.’

Luke blinks at him, then grins, ‘Fair enough.’ The boy turns around, and runs off in the direction that he came.

It is then that Obi-Wan realises: the voices are silent.

 


End file.
